US politics

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Dan Primack and Russell Contreras at Axios survey the ways in which the anti-Semitic, white supremacist “replacement theory” is being mainstreamed in the Republican Party. I pointed out in April that Tucker Carlson’s “White Power Hour” on Fox (Joy Reid’s term) is full of contradictions on replacement theory, and that […]

Arab Americans

For the First time, Israeli Apartheid was Broached in Congress by Rashida Tlaib – and then the Racist Epithets rained Down

Asa Winstanley

( Middle East Monitor) – [It is rare] for Israeli apartheid to be raised as a topic of discussion in the US Congress. In fact, I can’t recall that it has ever happened before, until last week. And the response in the US was even more ferocious, and particularly vindictive. It was also openly racist. […]

Climate Crisis

Avoiding water bankruptcy in the Southwest: What the US and Iran can learn from each other

The Conversation

By Mojtaba Sadegh, Ali Mirchi, Amir AghaKouchak and Kaveh Madani | – The 2021 water year ends on Sept. 30, and it was another hot, dry year in the western U.S., with almost the entire region in drought. Reservoirs vital for farms, communities and hydropower have fallen to dangerous lows. The biggest blow came in […]

Afghanistan

Generals on Afghanistan: Yes, Trump is Largely Responsible for Chaos

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Senate Hearing on the collapse of Afghanistan, at which the top US generals testified, underlined that actions taken by the Trump administration had a significant impact on undermining the Ashraf Ghani government and the Afghanistan National Army. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin admitted that, “The fact that the Afghan […]

Afghanistan

Droning On: Assassins-in-Chief and Their Brood

Tom Engelhardt

( Tomdispatch.com ) – What a way to end a war! Apologies all around! We’re so damn sorry — or actually, maybe not! I’m thinking, of course, about CENTCOM commander General Kenneth F. McKenzie, Jr.’s belated apology for the drone assassination of seven children as the last act, or perhaps final war crime, in this […]

Crime

More guns, pandemic stress and a police legitimacy crisis created perfect conditions for homicide spike in 2020

The Conversation

By Justin Nix | – Homicides in the U.S. spiked by almost 30% in 2020. That was the main takeaway from figures released on Sept. 27, 2021, by the FBI that showed almost uniform increases across America in the murder rate. The fact that big cities, small cities, suburbs and rural areas – in both […]

African-Americans

Haitian migrants at the border: An asylum law scholar explains how US skirts its legal and moral duties

The Conversation

By Karen Musalo | – The U.S.’s top envoy to Haiti resigned abruptly on Sept. 22, 2021, over the Biden administration’s “inhumane” treatment of Haitian migrants crossing the border via Mexico into Texas. The resignation came amid debate over the U.S. decision to deport thousands of Haitians entering the U.S. in search of asylum or […]

Drones

The Names You’ll Never Know: A Blue Kia and a Wall of Carnage on the Washington Mall

Nick Turse

( Tomdispatch.com) – As a parting shot, on its way out of Afghanistan, the United States military launched a drone attack that the Pentagon called a “righteous strike.” The final missile fired during 20 years of occupation, that August 29th airstrike averted an Islamic State car-bomb attack on the last American troops at Kabul’s airport. […]

Militarization

A Parable of (All-American) Violence: Accountability and the War of Terror

Tomdispatch

By Kelly Denton-Borhaug | ( Tomdispatch.com ) – As a religious studies professor, I know a parable when I see one. Consider the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks and the final events in this country’s war in Afghanistan as just such a parable taken directly from the history of our moment. The heart-wrenching last […]